Cohens on the Move

Cohens on the Move
Author: Carmi J. Neiger
Publisher:
Total Pages: 175
Release: 2018
Genre: Geographic information systems
ISBN: 9780438855175

In the 1960s and 1970s, as many large US cities experienced rapid racial and ethnic demographic shifts, the intra-urban residential settlement and migration patterns of American Jews came to the attention of sociologists and urbanists. Although the interest in this population has waned in favor of more recent immigrant groups, patterns of Jewish residential dynamics continue to evolve, reflecting changes over time in both Jewish religious and ethnic identity and assimilation into mainstream American society. The lack of Census data identifying households by religious affiliation requires an alternative approach to the study of this group. In the first section of this study, The Use of Distinctive Jewish Names in Locating Jews as an Urban Sub-Population in Cincinnati, Ohio, distinctive ethnic surnames were used to locate Jewish households. An empirically based and statistically supported list of Jewish names was developed for use in spatial and demographic analyses of the Jewish community of Cincinnati, Ohio, during the period between 1940 and 2000. This list of Cincinnati distinctive Jewish names (CDJNs) was used to geocode addresses from decadal phone directories. The resulting residential patterns of the CDJN Jews were nonrandom and remained distinct from other ethnic groups throughout the study period. The significantly higher degree of clustering that characterized the CDJN households is consistent with historical Jewish urban settlement patterns and supports the use of the CDJN list as a research tool. With minor modifications, the methodology used to develop the list can be used to provide reliable distinctive Jewish name lists for use elsewhere. The second section, Spatial Analysis of Jewish Residential Patterns in Cincinnati, Ohio, 1940-2000, investigates the residential dynamics of the geocoded CDJN households identified in the first section. Spatial distributions of CDJN addresses from 1940 to 2000 were compared with distributions of households associated with distinctive ethnic Irish and German names in Hamilton County, Ohio. All name groups were subjected to a series of spatial statistical tests, including global and local autocorrelation, which provided a set of measurements used to describe the residential patterns quantitatively. Areas of emerging, stable, and declining CDJN concentration were identified. The relationship between intra-county CDJN migration and key transportation arteries was assessed. Additionally, a subset of inter-decadal CDJN household moves were mapped. The discussion assessing the results of the tests and measurements paints a detailed picture of the evolving patterns of Jewish residential settlement and migration in the greater Cincinnati area during the study period.

The Forerunners

The Forerunners
Author: Robert P. Swierenga
Publisher: Wayne State University Press
Total Pages: 488
Release: 2018-02-05
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 081434416X

He details the contributions and the leadership provided by the Dutch Jews and relates how they lost their "Dutchnessand their Orthodoxy within several generations of their arrival here and were absorbed into broader American Judaism.

Jewish Soldiers in the Civil War

Jewish Soldiers in the Civil War
Author: Adam D. Mendelsohn
Publisher: NYU Press
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2022-11-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 1479812242

Offers an engaging account of the experiences of Jewish soldiers in the Union Army during the Civil War What was it like to be a Jew in Lincoln’s armies? The Union army was as diverse as the embattled nation it sought to preserve, a unique mixture of ethnicities, religions, and identities. Almost one Union soldier in four was born abroad, and natives and newcomers fought side-by-side, sometimes uneasily. Yet though scholars have parsed the trials and triumphs of Irish, Germans, African Americans, and others in the Union ranks, they have remained largely silent on the everyday experiences of the largest non-Christian minority to have served. In ways visible and invisible to their fellow recruits and conscripts, the experience of Jews was distinct from that of other soldiers who served in Lincoln’s armies. Adam D. Mendelsohn draws for the first time upon the vast database of verified listings of Jewish soldiers serving in the Civil War collected by The Shapell Roster, as well as letters, diaries, and newspapers, to examine the collective experience of Jewish soldiers and to recover their voices and stories. The volume examines when and why they decided to enlist, explores their encounters with fellow soldiers, and describes their efforts to create community within the ranks. This monumental undertaking rewrites much of what we think we know about Jewish soldiers during the Civil War.

Jewish Communities on the Ohio River

Jewish Communities on the Ohio River
Author: Amy Hill Shevitz
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Total Pages: 289
Release: 2007-08-17
Genre: History
ISBN: 0813172160

When westward expansion began in the early nineteenth century, the Jewish population of the United States was only 2,500. As Jewish immigration surged over the century between 1820 and 1920, Jews began to find homes in the Ohio River Valley. In Jewish Communities on the Ohio River, Amy Hill Shevitz chronicles the settlement and evolution of Jewish communities in small towns on both banks of the river—towns such as East Liverpool and Portsmouth, Ohio, Wheeling, West Virginia, and Madison, Indiana. Though not large, these communities influenced American culture and history by helping to develop the Ohio River Valley while transforming Judaism into an American way of life. The Jewish experience and the regional experience reflected and reinforced each other. Jews shared regional consciousness and pride with their Gentile neighbors. The antebellum Ohio River Valley's identity as a cradle of bourgeois America fit very well with the middle-class aspirations and achievements of German Jewish immigrants in particular. In these small towns, Jewish citizens created networks of businesses and families that were part of a distinctive middle-class culture. As a minority group with a vital role in each community, Ohio Valley Jews fostered religious pluralism as their contributions to local culture, economy, and civic life countered the antisemitic sentiments of the period. Jewish Communities on the Ohio River offers enlightening case studies of the associations between Jewish communities in the big cities of the region, especially Cincinnati and Pittsburgh, and the smaller river towns that shared an optimism about the Jewish future in America. Jews in these communities participated enthusiastically in ongoing dialogues concerning religious reform and unity, playing a crucial role in the development of American Judaism. The history of the Ohio River Valley includes the stories of German and East European Jewish immigrants in America, of the emergence of American Reform Judaism and the adaptation of tradition, and of small-town American Jewish culture. While relating specifically to the diversity of the Ohio River Valley, the stories of these towns illustrate themes that are central to the larger experience of Jews in America.

Religion in Ohio

Religion in Ohio
Author: Tarunjit Singh Butalia
Publisher: Ohio University Press
Total Pages: 433
Release: 2004
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0821415514

For Ohio's bicentennial in 2003, the Religious Experience Advisory Council of the Ohio Bicentennial Commission was established to commemorate and celebrate the state's diversity of religions and faith traditions. The end result of the council's efforts, Religion in Ohio tells the story of Ohio's religious and spiritual heritage going back to the state's ancient and historic native populations, and including the westward migration of settlers to this region, the development of a wide variety of faith traditions in the years preceding the mid-twentieth century, and the arrival of many newer immigrants in the last fifty years, each group bringing with it cherished traditions. Documenting the religious pluralism in Ohio and the impact faith communities have had on the state, this book includes chapters on the historical experiences and beliefs of over forty Christian groups, as well as Native American, Jewish, Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh, Baha'i, Jain, and Zoroastrian faiths. Each chapter was written by a member of that faith or denomination. Operating under the auspices of the Interfaith Association of Central Ohio, the editors of Religion in Ohio have created a unique collection o